Chapter 1097 — The Serene Jade Pill

CHAPTER 1097

The Serene Jade Pill

Shen Yaoqing came into the sickroom in white, with snow on her shoulders and a jade lotus at her belt.

Still in her cloak, Shen Yaoqing stopped three paces from the bed and gave a guest elder’s bow. Her formal manner didn’t hide how hard she’d ridden.

“Master Shi,” Shen Yaoqing said.

“Chief Disciple Shen,” Shi Feng said, and sat up a little against the pillows. “You came through the night.”

“My master said not to wait for morning,” Shen Yaoqing said. “So I didn’t.”

Lin Langtian sat up on his chairs and stared at her openly. Qin Wuyan, by the door, bowed to her as to the Serene Jade’s chief disciple, and she returned it exactly.

She took a small box of white jade from her sleeve and held it out with both hands.

“From Elder Ye Wanqiu,” Shen Yaoqing said. “A Serene Jade Soul-Settling Pill. When word came to the mountain of two skies over Weeping Pine Basin, and of who was under them, my master went to her own furnace that same night. She says it’s the sect’s return on the debt for her own pill.”

Shi Feng took the box and opened it.

The pale green pill gave off a cool scent that eased his scorched meridians. Shi Feng examined it closely. Seven clouds, at least. Elder Ye Wanqiu had refined it patiently, using only calming herbs.

It wasn’t a pill for wounds. It was a pill for a soul and a qi that had been pushed too far for too long.

“Elder Ye made this herself?” Shi Feng asked.

“With her own hands,” Shen Yaoqing said. “It’s the first pill she has refined since your Void-Mending Pill put her back on her feet.”

Shi Feng closed the box carefully.

“Tell Elder Ye I’m grateful,” Shi Feng said. “And tell her that as far as I’m concerned, the debt for her pill is settled.”

“My master decides when her debts are settled,” Shen Yaoqing said coldly. “Not you. I’ll tell her you said it.”

“…” Shi Feng said nothing, and put the box under his pillow.

In the corner, Lin Langtian made a small, approving noise.

Shen Yaoqing didn’t look at him. She looked at Shi Feng, and her voice stayed flat.

“There’s one more thing,” Shen Yaoqing said. “My master wanted you to hear it from the sect and not from the road. The Nangong house heard of the trap. The same night we did.”

Shi Feng waited.

“And it said nothing,” Shen Yaoqing said. “No message to the sect. No question to the elders’ hall. No word to my master. Nothing at all.”

“Is that unusual?” Shi Feng asked.

“When the Nangong house is pleased, it says nothing,” Shen Yaoqing said. “When it’s displeased, it also says nothing. It almost never sends a word down that mountain.” She paused. “But my master has watched that house for longer than I’ve been alive. She says silence from that house is not nothing.”

Shi Feng thought about the eighth peak, with no path and no snow falling on it. He thought of a screen, and a soft voice behind it, and the promise he had made there. He hadn’t expected a message from that house. He hadn’t expected to be thought of there at all.

Shi Feng was touched, but uncertain.

“Then what is it?” Shi Feng asked.

“I don’t know,” Shen Yaoqing said. “Nobody on the mountain knows. That’s why my master sent me.” She folded her hands. “She asked me to tell you one more thing, in her words. Dead men keep no promises to that house. So you’d better not become one.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Shi Feng said.

“Keep it in your ribs,” Shen Yaoqing said. “They need it more.”

A Wanyan servant came in with a tea tray, bowing, and began to set out cups. Shen Yaoqing was already turning to the door.

“Chief Disciple Shen,” Shi Feng said. “There’s tea.”

“I’m expected back at the Lotus Gate in nine days,” Shen Yaoqing said, without stopping. “The road takes eight. Get well, Master Shi. My master didn’t burn her best herbs for nothing.”

She bowed to Qin Wuyan at the door, he bowed back, and she went out into the dark. A moment later the sound of a single horse went down the estate road at a gallop.

The servant stared at the empty chair, teapot in hand.

“She didn’t drink any,” the servant said, bewildered.

“She’s in a hurry,” Shi Feng said. “Pour Senior Qin’s.”

The servant poured. Qin Wuyan took the cup and drank it without a word.

Lin Langtian was still looking at the door.

“Junior Brother,” Lin Langtian said slowly. “Who was that?”

“The Serene Jade’s chief disciple,” Shi Feng said, touching the box. “She was my host on the mountain. Her master made the pill.”

Lin Langtian considered the answer, then lay back on his chairs without pressing him.

“Good pill,” Lin Langtian said to the ceiling. “Smells honest. You should take it before it gets cold.”

“Pills don’t get cold,” Shi Feng said.

“Then before you think too much,” Lin Langtian said. “Same thing.”

Shi Feng took out the box again, looked at the pale green pill for a while, and swallowed it.

The cool went down through him slowly. It didn’t heal his ribs, and it didn’t mend his meridians. But for the first time since the grey dome went up, the burning in them stopped, and his qi lay still and quiet in his dantian.

He lay back against the pillows and listened to the wind on the estate wall.

On his two chairs in the corner, Lin Langtian was looking out of the dark window, toward the north. The mountains there couldn’t be seen at night. He looked anyway, for a long time, and he didn’t say a word.